The idea was to look at a few boats on the way to the one we were quite sure would be our new home. We'd do the deal, move aboard, put in a few month's work and by May we'd be somewhere around Mexico and ready to head for Australia.
Hah! Talk about starry eyed naivety...
Greece, the Netherlands, England, the USA west coast from Seattle to San Diego, Mexico, back to England, and Holland again, to say nothing of dipping into France and Belgium briefly, Spain, England, back to L.A., and eventually down to the Cayman Islands where we bought our boat in June, probably out of sheer exhaustion!
Initially we were planning to carry on the voyage the previous owners were on, which was to get out of the hurricane belt by heading for Panama.
A few weeks was enough to open our eyes to reality that that was a dumb idea, and we quickly formulated a Plan 'B'.
Frankly, the boat had been let go. The previous owners were desperate to sell and were spending the absolute minimum to keep her going.
So, we headed in the opposite direction to the USA and the opportunity to do the repairs and upgrades with Tom and his tools and contacts, that would have been impossible or ridiculously costly in the Caribbean.
On the 1500 nautical mile voyage we had the transmission go, then the water pump, and the bales holding the main sheet to the boom ripped out of the boom, and finally on arriving here the oil cooler packed in.
It was just as well we had Tom along because there was no way she was ready to be sailed by a couple.
Up here in Chesapeake Bay we have done a lot more work than we had planned and it's taken much longer than expected. Our thinking was to spend a couple of months doing repairs and upgrades, and at the end of the hurricane season head back down to the Caribbean, sometime in November.
We eventually resigned ourselves to the fact that we were going to have to spend the winter here.
It's now mid February and our revised date for departure, the first decent weather window after Feb 28, is only a couple of weeks away.
We've had rain and ice, and snow... in fact it's snowing right now, but we've also had patches of warmish weather. A few more of those and we will be able to finish the work and be on our way.
Sandy has been tackling the outside teak and what she has done is making such a big difference to the appearance of the boat. If the sun has been out, so has she, in spite of it still being extremely cold most of the time.
To hurry things along we've had to get outside people in to handle some of the work.
The list gets shorter, and then gets a few more things added.
We've just discovered that our batteries would most likely need replacing before we get back to Australia. This is probably the best and cheapest place to do it, and it means we can have a worry free trip as far as energy supply is concerned. But it's still not cheap, not like a car. We have 10 batteries in the house bank and 2 cranking batteries for the engine, generator and windlass.
And so it goes. With everything going on here, I haven't been in the right frame of mind to do blog entries, and for that I do apologize, especially to the folk who have been nudging me to keep it up.
I started an entry a couple of weeks ago and was going to just delete it, but it does remind us of what we were going through, and may still have to go through again.
I'm looking out of the pilothouse window at a field of ice, bank to bank the Sassafras river is frozen over. There is even a hungry eagle standing out there on it, contemplating how to go about getting a fish.
It is way below zero (c) at the moment, I don't even want to know how much.
With the cold weather we've been having a lot of condensation in the boat. Warm air in the boat meets cold from outside and result is water in lockers, bilges and running down the windows.
Well, it's not running now, it's frozen solid. The insides of the windows are sheets of ice, particularly the overhead hatches and all the windows at night.
We are rugged up and have 2 heaters going full time now, and are just managing to cope with the cold. On the bed we have the bottom sheet, then a soft fluffy blanket of synthetic fibre that flashes in the dark. That's to slide into bed on because the sheet itself would cause serious injury I'm sure.
Then there is a sheet, warm blanket, thick quilt, another warm blanket, and often another blanket or 2 on top. Once our feet thaw out it's actually quite warm.
Sandy found some covers that go around the back of the cockpit doghouse, over shade cloth screens and they keep the wind out. So we have a fully enclosed cockpit that provides a bit of a barrier to the cold and makes getting in and out of the companionway less of a shock. All door vents and spaces where control lines run have been taped over with foam to keep the cold out.
This is such a far cry from the Caribbean where we were meant to be..."
That was not a good day...
It's hard to imagine ourselves sailing out of this place. We've been here for 6 months today. We've started our bulk buying and ordering in the navigation chips for the chart plotter, as well as a back up GPS, and VHF radio etc etc.
Some days we catch a bit of the excitement and can't wait to get going. Other days are weighed down with the jobs we're still getting through.
But one thing is certain, Wind Wanderer truly has become our home, and in spite of everything, there is nothing Sandy and I would rather be doing.
Untilo next time...